His son Jasjit Singh Banni is contesting the seat, and is expected to give a tough fight to Congress candidate Deepinder Singh Dhillon.

The Jalalabad and Khanuwan seats were rendered vacant as the sitting legislators Sher Singh Gubaya and Partap Singh Bajwa were elected to the Lok Sabha in the recent general elections.

The Badal government has two years and seven months to go before the next assembly poll in Punjab in February-March 2012.

State's Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) Kusumjit Sidhu said: 'Out of the 479 polling stations in the three constituencies, 75 have been declared sensitive, 36 very sensitive and 253 hyper sensitive by the state election commission.'

'Besides the local police officials, fifteen companies of paramilitary forces will be deployed to maintain law and order,' she added.